je t'aime
by Ophelias dream
Summary: An old love affair.
1. Prolouge

Disclaimer.

_Prologue_

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In respect to autumn, romantic images of red leaves falling and turning from red to orange to yellow in a beautiful act of departure fill the minds of many. But really, most places don't get reds and oranges and yellows, they get browned and shriveled leaves covered with dirt and made soggy by the mud below.

The picturesque view of autumn so many hold in there mind is banished almost the moment one excitedly looks out their window in expectance and instead one almost thinks it is winter. That's just the way it usually is; but if one is willing to go the distance, there is always somewhere that has the beautiful colors of autumn and the nostalgic feeling of things that never really were.

Through the shriveled leaves, a shriveled old woman walks. Slow, sure steps take her through the leaves.

She's a pretty and old woman. Straight backed and petite with a fleck of youth in either eye, if she had anymore than those two flecks no one would call her an old woman but that's all she has and that's what she is. Her face is almost as white as her hair, and her hair is quite white, with so many wrinkles that it would be difficult to decide whether she had cried too much or laughed too much in life. Staring at her face though, one would hope that they were lines of bliss and not of worry.

She is over dressed for the weather as the elderly sometimes are; bundled up for winter in her winter coat and winter boots, gloves on either hand and a scarf round her neck. There is a scarf wrapped around her head too, covering her head so much that only a few strands of white hair can be seen. She's small but not delicate looking; she looks sturdy in spirit though her body is clearly letting out.

She is a woman often seen but rarely spoken to; she is the kind of woman that you see and sometimes wonder about, wondering whether she was pretty or not, or why she seems so alone, perhaps if she had a family or not and if she did does she still?

She's the kind of lady that makes you sad even when she smiles; because the years that have surly worn down her smile make you wonder why she must now smile alone. But there she is, walking alone steadily towards a placed where the leaves do indeed fall red and where if you are willing to walk a ways, there is a bench—perfect to sit on and enjoy the autumn colors from.


	2. Chapter 1

_je t'aime_

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_Thump._

A small being plopped herself down on to one side of a bench with a huff and a violent shake of her head; she slumped her small body down on the bench until her legs touched the ground. Clearly she was not a being to be reckoned with, you could practically see a very large tantrum, tottering on the edge of her very small self. She looked like she was ready to raise hell. None the less, the elderly woman sitting on the opposite side of the bench turned to her new young companion with much composure and little notice.

"Hello there." she said softly, her body turned slightly to take in the girl sitting beside her.

The little girl was no doubt beautiful, but all children are without a doubt beautiful so this is nothing amazing. She was a wisp of a child with wispy blonde hair and if it were possible, wispy eyes, grey with brown lashes to hide behind. Her face was an expression of every emotion playing across her childish chest, frustration in her sparkling eyes, annoyance in her upturned nose and boredom in the pout of her mouth. She was a beautiful child beyond her appearance though; she had a pure childlike soul to match her face.

She moved her eyes to the face of the old woman and opened her mouth a little, emitting a sound that was intended as a greeting and nodded her head an inch or two in recognition. Her eyes poured over the old lady with great interest and in a blink were done and faced forward again.

It had been a long while since the old woman had spoken to anyone so she surveyed the child just as the child had surveyed her, but took her time and waited until she saw a slight ease in the small girls obvious frustration before speaking again.

"What's wrong?" the woman asked pleasantly, no pressure, no accusation, just light conversation between bench-mates.

The little girl eyed the lady sharply for a second and then gave in and kicked up her legs bringing with them a violent storm of reds and oranges, as the colors settled she nearly yelled, "I hate this stupid park!" and then turned to the lady sitting beside her with almost aggressive movement.

It almost looked as if she resented the lady sitting at the other end of the bench, but her eyes quickly turned to pure annoyance rather then resentment. "There's nothing to do here," she shot out almost defensively, "nothing exciting never happens here! No one _ever_ comes here to play with me! It's wet and the mud makes me slip whenever I run and I don't even _want _to run around; that's just what I'm _told_ to do. It's miserable and cloudy out as usual and I just wanted my tea!" she huffed out in a single breath her voice raising with passionate inflections every so often.

"It's just STUPID" she screamed kicking up another storm and the glancing over at the lady waiting for a reaction to her outburst; but the lady just stared back at her with open eyes that portrayed nothing.

The little girl had been expected to be reprimanded, at the very least get a 'now, now no need to yell about it,' but the lady next to her just looked calm and serene. After a few seconds she opened her mouth and said, "maybe..." in a somewhat interested somewhat nonchalant tone and with that the two of them just sat together for a moment.

The little girls nose came down and her eyes softened and her mouth loosed its pout as she gazes at the path and the trampled leaves in front of her. As soon as she'd calmed, her outburst was forgotten, her frustration and impending tantrum was left behind almost immediately and she looked at the lady with new eyes.

She became the interested one. The lady had turned her attention up into the leaves of the tree above. The little girl glanced up and the quickly looked back at the lady hoping to catch her eye, but the lady stayed still.

The little girl rustled around and made noise as straightening up as best she knew how but the lady still didn't turn her gaze. If the little girl had looked closer though, she would have seen a small upturn in the lady's lips.

Finally loosing all pretense of subtlety she scooched up next to the lady and stared until the lady looked down and smiled, with a 'yes, how can I help you?' look in her eyes, but not an unkind one.

"What are _you_ doing here?" she demanded, not rudely either, only childlike. It seemed perfectly normal in her eyes to believe that if she had just ranted her frustrations and reasonings the lady ought to do her the same honor. But the lady just gave her the same faint smile and turned her gaze upward.

"Oh, nothing exciting." she said, it wasn't an end of conversation kind of tone but it was clearly all she was going to say just then.

"Oh, yea..." the little girl looked at the old lady still a little confused and very interested. They sat like that a second more until the insatiable need to fill the silence caught up in the little girls throat.

"There sure are a lot of leaves around here," she stated conversationally and it worked a little. The lady let her head dropped and looked around the park at eye level, "There are, aren't there?" she said letting a real smile grace her lips and she turned to the little girl clearly giving her, her full attention like she wanted.

"I guess this park isn't so stupid anyways, it's got some pretty trees" the little girl was obviously not shy around strangers. Her entire aura was different now. She was quirky and a little too out spoken now, but these are good qualities in a child.

"No, maybe not." the lady agreed with a solemn nod. The little girl returned the nod. It seemed the proper thing to do.

She was a proper child, not proper as in, she sat with a straight back and her feet tucked beneath her just so but she looked properly like she was a child and she had the beautiful presence of a truly innocent being.

"So why are you here? If my mum hadn't forced me here I'd much rather be inside having my tea with Marta." she stated matter-of-factly in a tone that obviously implied that anyone who freely came to the dreadful park rather then go to a nice tea with Marta by _choice_ was a little off in _her_ books.

The old lady didn't even bother to ask who Marta was but replied.

"Yes, well, I think I've had quite enough tea over my lifetime, and not half so many beautiful autumn days."

The little girl nodded at this matter-of-factly too and let out a small giggle, "I guess you're right." she smiled at the old lady. Her giggle was young and refreshing to the ladies ears.

"So you just come here cause it's pretty?" she asked letting her giggle die down.

"I guess you could say that; it's very soothing, the red and the orange and how the leaves change and wither and come back again." The lady let out a breath and looked around and then turned back to her small companion.

"It's funny, but I think this is the most beautiful season of the year, even though it really is the season that all the plants are dying."

"I guess it is kind of pretty, I never thought of it as dying though. Dying seems like winter, cold and dead and no color at all not even in the park." the girl said making a face of obvious distaste. Apparently winter was even less exciting than autumn.

"It _would_ seem more like winter wouldn't it?" agreed the lady, "but it really is autumn when the leaves die and fall from their branches. It isn't really sad though. It's just the season of beginnings, it holds hands with spring; this season they fall, spring they rise green again." she finished with a wistful sigh.

The little girl contemplated the ladies words for a moment and then turned to her with a furrowed brow, obviously a little put out.

"I don't think that's why I like it" she said bluntly.

The lady let out a short laugh, "No, me neither." her eyes smiled at the girl and the flecks of youth in her eyes began to brighten.

"I think I like it, because its beautiful." she stated simply after some more thought.

The lady nodded in deep agreement, "Me too." she looked up again and this time the little girl did too and they sat together looking at the leaves a few minuets.

This time it was the lady to break the silence, "Sometimes it's those moments that you know are painful, like the leaves dying and falling from the trees that are so beautiful that you can't help enjoying it even though you know you ought to be preparing for winter." the lady seemed to forget she was with a little girl. "But look at all those beautiful colors" she raised her arm and waved the at the leaves above. "I never could dwell on winter during autumn." she finished with a smile towards the skies.

The small girl smiled at the lady and then looked at her arm. In raising her arm the lady revealed her one piece of jewelry, a thin silver bracelet.

"That's a pretty bracelet." she said clasping her small hand lightly on the lady's arm steadying it and touching the silver chain lightly with the tips of her fingers. She fingered the small charms on the bracelet, one of which she noticed was a leaf, the chain was sparse and there were only a few charms but the girl looked carefully at it.

Her hands stopped on a very small heart. "Is this a locket?" she asked glancing up, remembering the lady whose arm the bracelet rested on. The lady looked at the girl with eyes that weren't smiling any more but were still friendly and nodded slightly.

The little girl carefully pried open the locket and let out a small noise of triumph, followed by a coo of delight as she looked inside.

She looked up again, "They're so beautiful! Who are they?"

The old lady was smiling again.

"That's me." she said pointing to one side of the locket, looking down at the other half thoughtfully.

If the little girl was surprised she hid it well, she just nodded and said "You were very pretty." keeping her gaze interestedly on the locket.

The lady laughed, not insulted, "I think you're very pretty too." she replied.

The little girl laughed and nodded, she had heard this before, but then she shook her head smiling still said "Yes, but you were beautiful."

"Is this your husband?" she asked pointing to the other side, then quickly looked down at the ladies hand and saw no ring on her finger.

"I guess I do look rather nice in this," the lady said eyeing the picture as if it were the first time in a while, he gaze turned sad, "No that's not my husband, he's just an old flame I guess." Her face said it was so much more than an old flame though, and the little girl could see it.

She looked up and the little girl met her eyes.

"Would you like to hear the story?" she asked.

She just nodded.

So the lady began.

Sorry this chapter isn't very intresting, kinda like the last one... but the next one will be! I swear!


	3. Chapter 2

_**Chapter 2**_  
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"This story begins a long time ago, when I was very young.

It is, of course, going to be a story about love and this love is between a girl and a boy. These two, the boy and the girl, were not always close, in fact most of their lives they were brought up to hate each other and even more than hate each other, disrespect each other.

The amount of energy we spent, just to dislike each other, seems silly and overdramatic now. Our only excuse was youth and that when you are younger logic is lesser to passionate, even if incorrect, action. Perhaps we are worse off when we lose that though.

You could not totally blame youth for our less than perfect impressions of each other though; in fact it was our parents that really started it. Our parent's despised each other for as long as our families remember. Each of my own six brothers despised him and he them. It was a feud as old as our families, a deep seated hatred, unquestioned and unparalleled and also completely unreasonable.

All of us kids ended up going to the same school but being the youngest I only actually attended school at the same time as one of my brothers, my brother and that boy. Our school was... how shall I say this, a specialty school I suppose. We boarded there all year except for summer holiday and for a handful of students, Christmas as well. The school was located somewhere way out in the countryside so contact with outside society was minimal.

Even though there were a few hundred kids it is inevitable that you end up closer to everyone than you could imagine, and often more than you would like. To that extent this boy and me ended up spending six years practically living together and with feuding families, let me tell you, there were more than a couple rifts.

It wasn't only our families that didn't get along, even within the school we were divided and rivals. We respectively belonged to Slytherin and Gryffindor, opposing houses. At our school each student was placed in a house based, well, on personality traits I suppose; that seems rather silly now as a child's personality changes most rapidly but that was how it was, and this boy and I were put in the most infamously opposing houses in the school, another feud practically as old as time. His house verses mine, house rivalry was, at that time, tumultuous.

We'd gone to school together for 5 years when it all began, or where at least _we_ began. With barely had any interaction, except for the occasional unpleasantries, until our sixth year. In our sixth year something happened, we collided.

I call it a collision because it was the combination of complete opposites, so it had to have been a little explosive. It wasn't really a collision though, it was more like an unexpected merging. Our houses and our families were different as could be, not to mention ourselves. His house wore green, I wore red. His house lived bellow ground I lived above. He was an only child; I was the last of seven. He was rich, I was poor. My hair was vibrant and the color of fire, his was pale, almost white. And that was just at face value. He was all pride, I was all passion. He loved morning, I loved night. I loved art because it made me feel alive, he loved life because it felt like art. We were different but not completely incompatible.

Perhaps it was just one of those 'opposites attract' kind of things. I wouldn't really call what we had attraction. In the beginning we were never really attracted to each other, we just bumped into each other one day and fit, without knowing it, it took us a while to see the whole picture too.

Our first meeting or collision or whatever it's called was during mid autumn when the leaves were falling everywhere. I had a short break between classes, for once all my work was caught up with, so I decided to take a stroll around the grounds away from the castle and away from the people. However lovely it is to have a nice big family, there is often a fair amount of smothering that goes on, especially when you're the youngest. One of the greater freedoms of living away from home was the ability to be alone.

Completely caught up in myself, I walked farther and farther from the school. The weather was cold but a cold that felt nice on my skin. So I barely noticed anything around me. I took pleasure in not having to think or do anything but just walk.

That's where it happened. Looking back it wasn't a spectacular meeting but it was something.

He was sitting on a rock over looking the forest and smoking a cigarette. He looked so at ease, so undisturbed by his surroundings and at the same time deep in thought. It was an odd way to see him. In my eye's he was just a bratty rich kid that was always up to no good. This was the first time I thought of him as just another kid.

I turned, deciding maybe I'd just leave him alone. But he moved just then, I guess he'd heard me. He looked at me for a second and then turned around again and just took another drag from his cigarette. I don't know what it was but something about being ignored just made me snap.

I felt as if I were the one doing the right thing, being the bigger person, willing to leave him to his peace and cigarettes, but there he was, trying to snottily show me up by being indifferent to _me_. I guess the bigger person doesn't just scream this at someone though, so I walked over and sat near him.

'Hey' I said. Maybe if I annoyed him enough he'd snap and I could feel okay about it. Maybe if something normal happened I could forget about him maybe being human too.

His head barely turned, I wondered if he could even see me out of his peripheral vision; and then he just sort of nodded. What was that? Acknowledgement? Was he trying to goad me or did he really not care that I was invading his privacy, that we were sharing space? Heck, _I_ was annoyed at him being in _my_ space.

As I got closer nothing happened, he didn't even ignore me he just acted with an air of complete indifference. I hated that.

'You don't mind?' I asked, say yes, and please say yes. I knew he would know what I was talking about, even if he wouldn't react to it.

'Whatever.'

Whatever? So un-feeling, so nonchalant how could he not care? I cared _for_ him!

Then, even I'll admit it, I lost it maybe just a little. I think I was more confused than I would have liked to admit. At that moment I just couldn't stand looking at him and even more couldn't stand to be the one to walk away. It was petty and for no reason, but there it was.

'Leave.'

He didn't even respond.

'Leave!' I yelled

He didn't even turn, he just sort of smiled. He just kept smoking and looking and ignoring my outburst.

'Just let it be, alright?' he said, irritated. But I think he might have just pretended to be so to pacify me, to show me up in a way.

I guess I kind of gave in, maybe I realized that I wasn't fighting anything other than the unexpected, I doubt it though. I can't pretend I was that level headed; I was probably just too intrigued to risk actually upsetting him. So we just sat there and watched the leaves fall.

He finished his cigarette and lit another and leaned back on his arms. Then he turned to me like I hadn't just been shouting, like I wasn't a sworn enemy and like I didn't matter in a positive or a negative way. He looked at me like I was nothing and I liked it, it was my first clean slate and blank canvas. Then it occurred to me, I could be anyone I wanted, I could be a bitch I could be flirty or tomboyish, but even better than all that, I could be me. It was so refreshing and at the same time, so scary. Because to him, it wouldn't matter.

'Look at all the red, just like you' he smirked nodding at all the leaves taking a breath between drags. It was almost a complement I felt, one I couldn't figure out but it seemed more than just not nasty. Then he added 'look at all that red, falling and dying.' he was being nice in his own way, he was making it easy. Easy to be me without feeling obligated to be anyone because he would still be the same old Malfoy for me.

'It's still beautiful' I replied not nastily but stubbornly with my chin jutting out. 'Plus it's a whole winter before anything turns green again' Our house colors were green and red you'll remember, and that represented so much more than just school spirit.

He looked at me for a second, then shrugged a little and turned his gaze to the leaves again and nodded slightly, 'I guess so,' he agreed. What? He agreed?  
'But' but, that was more like it, 'it's green for a great deal longer than this. This is nice in its own way though, I guess, if you don't count its deceptiveness." he said waving his half smoked cigarette through the air.

'This isn't deception... there's more truth to this than endless fields of green. These moments of autumn are close to momentary but it's beautiful in these moments, it's _real_; it's temporary, but that's just like real life, temporary, tragic but beautiful none the less! Just like truth.'

'Sure Weasley it's truth.' he said with a knowing smirk. He was done with his cigarette and he tossed it. 'See you Weasley.'

That was it? 'Hey don't throw that! What, do you want to start a fire!'

He walked towards me and leaned down and looked at me at eye level 'It would be temporarily beautiful though, wouldn't it Weasley?'

I just stared back at him, I just didn't get him, and what annoyed me worse was that he always seemed to be one clever remark ahead of me; one clever true remark. He started to walk away and then turned his head a little and said 'Make sure to bundle up for winter, don't want your fire going out or anything like that.' and then he just walked, steadily, unaffected and calmly with his hands in his pockets, back to the school.

Then I realized something, maybe he wasn't being Malfoy for me, maybe he just always was; maybe he was the real one. With that thought I watched him walk with a detached almost uncaring feeling. Sure, the whole situation weirded me out some but autumn really was just too beautiful to waste and I had just realized it; so I sat there, leaning back on my arms for support, enjoying autumn until it was time for class.

That was out first encounter. Our beginning. After that we didn't run into each other again until winter.

Autumn might have been our defining moment but winter was our month.


	4. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

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Life was busy then, I am aware and remember that a lot was happening, but as time passed all those things melted into a blur— this is all I remember now. As vivid as some things are about that year, I can barely remember the dormitory that I spent so many years in, yet I could explain to you the exact make up of a certain tree by a certain lake. Sometimes I remember other things, fleeting images of people I can no longer really remember. It's a little foolish really.

Before they passed away, my family always made me try a bit harder to remember; when they were around I found myself trying to force memories back into my head, a sense of guilt would fill me that I couldn't remember every Christmas or that a couple years slipped my mind, while his eyes and every contour of his body was imbedded forever. I guess I never moved on and it made me feel bad that those that loved me still looked for an old flame in my eyes that had long gone out. I still lived and still had fun but I lost hope of fulfillment. I had been given something more beautiful than I should have, and it was ripped away.

Don't get me wrong I was not one girl that's entirety was one boy. It's just, at the end of your life, you have plenty of good memories and bad memories but the worthwhile ones are the ones that make you feel an unparalleled intensity of bliss and pain at the same time. Later in life I often felt guilty that those feelings never arose from anyone other than him, that so many that loved me, that so many people that considered me close and dear did not merit 'worthwhile memories' but I imagine they had never felt what I had felt for another or they would have understood; I would understand. But they didn't, they clung to the idea of me moving on until they all left me as well.

Of course, things that I was before him are all important to mention too. They shaped me into a capable being; but he made me alive. I was so young then, it's so easy to remember being that young but so hard to grasp when I stare in a mirror. I feel lost, lost of my youth, lost of my energy and lost of passion. A loss I fear far too many feel.

I had a young spirit for sure but before him I was a slightly weighed down youth. I was a decent student, I cared about what I did and I studied _mostly _every night. There was of course the occasional incident where I played a bit more than I worked. But I was okay. I had fun and did decently in my classes. I was on the road to life in the comfort zone, and I took comfort in that in its self.

Of course there was drama coursing through the very veins of our school. Because the school was directed to a select type sometimes we kidded ourselves into thinking that we were above such things as drama and adolescent ordeals. That is not so. Although, I was never quite detached, I never really took part in the drama; I was either too careful, or I cared too little. Whatever it was, I passed the first few years of my schooling blissfully void of it. It was something that I forced myself to appreciate. Deep down I craved the drama though, I think we all do. The moment I began to forget about it a little bit. The moment I forfeited to the fact that I was untouchable and perhaps I could get around to that drama later in life; in that moment, it began.

It was when I started taking time for myself that I realized how beautiful and wonderful it was, the ability to select solitude above the bustle of every day life, was when I began to take less comfort in the security blanket that was my life. I would go out and sit with a notebook and a quill and just let things go from hand to paper. Some were pictures and some were words. Some were quite pretty and others quite ugly; but it was all nice. Nothing was coherent and I loved it. Even things that were distinct objects showed no correlation to anything that was in front of me. The world began to be a more beautiful place.

I soon made it a point to go out and just _be_ once or twice a week. I always picked a fairly secluded area with a reasonably comfortable place to sit. And I began to feel like I was alive, not only that, I soon realized that not only did I really feel alive but I was really okay without someone else. I wasn't kidding myself anymore, I wasn't alone; I had become independent.

Of course someone else would and could enrich my life, perhaps make me happier than I myself could ever achieve alone. But I would by no means be unhappy to be alone; I would under no circumstances be unfulfilled alone. Just as long it was never taken from me. If I was never given the opportunity, then I would never feel the loss. It would be no loss. There is only loss if there is gain. Unfortunately or fortunately, I do not know, I have gained and lost much in life in almost equal portions.

But where is the excitement in that?

Perhaps I was subconsciously hoping to run into him again. Maybe that really was what was dictating my newfound sense of happiness, he'd certainly love that. But then again maybe not, maybe the new found happiness dictated his arrival in my life.

Moments and stages like that in life should be appreciated because they are always fleeting. A human is not human without reasonable drama in their life; without that change. If life were comfort and stability we would loose that reason to get up everyday, or at least that reason to push ourselves forward.

I bounced around the lake and forest that year from one spot to another, I returned to some spots often and others never again. But I always avoided the spot I met Malfoy, I felt like id have to come to terms with something if I went back. But I eventually returned to it, though it gave me a bit of unease. I knew there was a greater chance that he would be there and it filled me with a sense of anxiety.

But he wasn't, and I remembered how beautiful it was and realized I was a fool for staying away. I didn't have to bounce around the grounds. I could have a spot that could be _my _spot. I'd forgotten though, or maybe hadn't realized yet that that could never be my spot; because it was _our_ spot.

When we came together the second time it was he who came upon me. I was at our spot and I was lost in my head.

I didn't particularly think deep thoughts when I was alone and I wasn't necessarily always being creative, it was just those sometimes that I was that made it worthwhile. If you thought a lot you are given a few beautiful thoughts, and believe me a few is enough to sustain you if you know what to do with them.

But before and after and in between my thoughts and creativity, I just sat and got lost in time for the most part

And that's where he caught me; lost. Lost and found I guess.

I was so lost in my own head, that when he came upon me, I didn't even notice. So much for seeker reflexes.

He looked down at my paper which at that point was a series of scribbles or free flowing lines, as I called them.

"Its nice Weasley." he said, neither loudly nor quietly, but it startled me none the less. I was so lost in thought that it even took me a second to process that someone had found me. My face must have looked like a blank slate for a good thirty seconds.

I imagine it was a long time because eventually his eyebrow rose and I blinked, but I really don't know how long, it could have been mere seconds, he wasn't very patient mostly.

Then finally I snapped to life and looked down at my paper and stared at it. It was a series of scribbles and illegible words, which even if you could read were completely random.

"Yea, I guess it's a little abstract." I said still staring at it and turning my paper an odd second.

He snorted, or sniffed as he would say, Malfoy's didn't make involuntary noises through the nose. He is, by store front, a very dignified being.

After our greetings, I suppose you would call them greetings by our standards, he walked past me to what seemed to be the same rock. The view was considerably different, this time he was sitting next to me too.

He sat and took out a cigarette, he turned his head slightly, not marring his posture in the least and asked: "Do you mind?"

I wrinkled my nose a little, "No, not particularly. It's a nasty habit though."

He nodded, "Yea, so is eating candy and taking chances. Flying and Snape's class run a higher likelihood of killing in one fell swoop.

I laughed. "I guess your right."

He nodded, of course he was right.

"Plus," he added almost as an after thought "it calms me like nothing else. Its proven to ease anxiety you know." He lifted his eyebrows at me and gave me half a smirk.

I looked at him. If that was true I could us a cigarette every time I saw him and I'm pretty sure he knew it.

He smoked his cigarette and it was true, his back seemed to ease from ridged upper class societal posture to the grace and ease he instinctively already possessed. He looked over at me and blew out a cloud of smoke into the cold sky.

"Whatever happened to the robes?" He asked

"What robes?" I asked getting hot headed already, he must know I hadn't had the money for robes this winter, its not like I was a working girl or a girl of infinite money like he was.

"The ones I told you to use Weasley" he said, rolling his eyes. I could feel his eyes flicker to my neck to the three inches of wrist showing bellow my too short sleeves in just a second and he looked forward again, at the lake.

"Whatever." I mumbled.

He knew; I didn't need to verify it for him. I didn't need to tell him I was too poor, he already knew that. What was his deal? Why'd he come and sit down. If he wanted peace, like it looked like he came outside to smoke for, why didn't he just leave me alone? I stared at his form beside me, he just sat there smoking, staring at the frozen lake.

I looked at him, Malfoy was not usually the bigger person, so I would be. I began to pick up my things with the intention of leaving. It really wasn't worth it to me, to ruin my mood.

He scoffed and turned a little, I wasn't taking pains to stay quite, after all my blood still did love a fight, "Don't give yourself an aneurism Weasley." He said getting up and walking towards me again.

I got the feeling he was annoyed with me. It was weird, I'd come to except indifference from him. He didn't avoid me or my presence at school, it was just like he didn't know me and didn't notice me, he could look at me and I could know he really didn't see me. It was when I noticed that, that I realized there is some beauty in solitude. Staring at faces in the crowd and not running the danger of having to connect to them.

He was standing right next to me looking down at me and holding my gaze, I just turned and looked down at the ground in front of the lake, not exactly staring at my feet and not exactly looking at the view, just not looking at his gaze. He didn't say anything, and I wasn't going to be the one to break first, instead of words though I felt something heavy land on my head.

"_Bundle up_ Weasley, don't go ruining the pretty picture." He said, his voice was muffled; he'd dropped his heavy cloak on my head.

I was about to protest and demand an explanation but then I looked down and realized I had in fact had drawn a pretty decent picture and it was of right where we were sitting.

He was already at shouting distance by the time I'd looked up again. I didn't feel the need to shout thanks, and I'm pretty sure he didn't feel the need to hear them.

I scowled and glared at his back for good measure though, just incase he could see with his head turned, I wouldn't have been surprised.

Then I shrugged on the cloak he'd left behind. I was after all, a little cold.


	5. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

-

We'd always start with nothing, maybe just a question, or perhaps even just a word and that one word or question would take on a mind of its own. We once, staring at the lake and conjecturing how cold it was, escaladed our conversation into a search for the most plausible way to stay in the lake; a combination of charms and guts we decided in the end I think. It was freezing and we spent the whole day there, I guess that sounds kind of weird, but I don't know how else to explain it other than it was quite a nice day.

That was only sometimes, that we'd end up doing crazy stuff, mostly we just talked. Sometimes we talked about really stupid things, like blood and nepotism and other times about more important things. It's incredible how unimportant the war and all the silly ideals seemed.

These are the memories I can re-live almost completely our words were more powerful than a lot of our actions, but perhaps it was all just due to circumstances. In our circumstances there was no act, we were not allowed to act, the best we could do was exchange words, but our words were nothing little or insignificant. One or our exchanges took place in the mid-afternoon. It was odd actually, usually we met early morning or evening; if we tried met up in the afternoon people generally noticed our absences and we would just get sidetracked on our way to the lake. But there we were, mid-afternoon on a freezing winter's day. My notebook was unopened and his cigarette was almost done. Being bored, and myself, I walked unceremoniously up to and plopped down next to him.

I knew unladylike manners and acts irritated him, but there was really nothing to do, I was a simpleton and he was an aristocrat and unfortunately for him he enjoyed my company too much to do anything about it.

I fell backwards and let myself just lay on the snowy ground. It was hard packed so I wasn't going to fall through. Plus, I had made a habit of wearing his cloak, so I most likely wouldn't get wet; it was incredibly thick, probably due to it being incredibly expensive.

I stared up at the sky, which on that particular day was a usual blue with clouds. Not the puffy kinds of clouds that you see rubber ducks and trains in but just wisps here and there, one of my favorite kind.

"I love art Malfoy." I sighed looking at the sky, and enjoying the cold on my face.

He barely moved his head but I could see the small flinch from the corner of my eye, and I could tell he was looking down at me. He was in his usual position, sitting up right with his hands resting behind him to support him.

"I'm sure you do Weasley," He sighed, not exasperatedly.

"People like pretty things." He said finishing up his cigarette and disposing of it completely.

"That's not it!" I exclaimed, turning my head slightly to glare up at him. I must have looked like a little child, hair every where, lying in the snow, pouting. I knew it too but I didn't really care, and I kind of knew he didn't either. He just looked back down at me with blank eyes that were unassuming and not riled up in the least, unlike my own.

"Art… is like life. It's got nothing to do with being pretty! It's-it's about being alive! And it's being vibrant, it's meaningful and full, it's… painful to live sometimes but it's there." I breathed out passionately. "_And_ it's rarely pretty either!" but then I added as an afterthought, "It is quite beautiful though." My expression must have softened, ranting did that to me, drained me completely emotionally, unless of course it just riled me up more, but in this case it was the former.

I had stopped looking at his face mid way through my explosion of words; it was embarrassing to look into his eyes when I was yelling like a four year old over candy, especially when the subject meant much more to me than that. I looked back at him then and he was smirking at me.

"Weasley, you've got it backwards. It's: life is like art. It makes a beautiful picture after all the hard earned brush strokes or hours sculpting, yet it is tragically temporary no matter how you try to preserve it. It can be completely meaningless to the entire world but one person and touch everyone and with such power it is _still_ temporary." He looked at me challengingly, his voice didn't rise, but I could feel more emotion than usually ever came out of him.

He continued after a few seconds "It only exists for as long as people give credit to it. Then, it falls through the cracks, it becomes meaningless, but oh-so meaningful still. And Weasley, the thing to remember about art is that only the master pieces are remembered, and that doesn't make them the best by any means." He looked down at me for a long moment with an eyebrow raised, I suppose trying to see if I understood what he'd said. I think it was then that I realized he was quite a passionate being, I had always know I was but it was different for Draco. He really was a passionate being, but had so little to be passionate about; it was also the first time I felt like protecting Draco but mostly I wanted to protect his passion.

I stared back and then turned to the sky, I let the silence linger for a few minuets and then opened my mouth again, "I have no idea what I want to do in life sometimes…" a safer subject, a more meaningless subject, the future.

You may question how that can be meaningless. But for me and Draco Malfoy; it was all meaningless, the future would come and it would happen but we are not our futures. We are our present's and neither of us believed in making the future more important than the present, especially when the present had so much to offer.

"I want to be an artists mostly, even though I'm not good but other times, I want to be a cook or a nurse or a teacher." I let out an exasperated sigh, it was appropriate, and on occasion I can be a proper lady.

"You'd make a good teacher." He assented.

"Not a nurse?" I asked, actually slightly offended, healing had always been a niche of mine. At home, my mother couldn't mend _all_ my brothers all the time, I was nurse two, and that was nothing to sneeze at.

He didn't even seem to mind that he'd offended me and continued looking out at the lake, "You think you could watch people die Weasley?"

"I'm not that weak." I mumbled, I'd never thought of it that way though. I was sure it would be difficult but I thought I could get through that. I supposed you'd have to watch some die to even save most.

"It's not being weak Weasley," He said matter of-factly glancing down at me. "it's being caring." He didn't look at me, his gaze still on the lake, yet I could feel him staring at me

"I could watch people die Weasley." he said offhand.

"You care." I rolled my eyes, I didn't mean it though, and he knew it, I just didn't want the talk to get explosive and too serious.

He didn't argue with that, "But I'm not car_ing_." he said

I gave him a funny look, I finally realized what he was telling me. Draco Malfoy might look like a closed book but he drops the subtlest of hints, 90 of which I'm sure went right past me, but not this one.

"You want to be a healer?" I asked.

"Something like that." he smirked at me, a 'good job' sort of smirk with a hint of triumph.

"That's weird I said," and stared at the sky for a few seconds, "you'd make a good doctor." I finished truthfully.

"That's a lot more school for you though." I turned to him, I wondered if he actually wanted to keep going to school.

"Nah." He said offhandedly, which was a big sign that it wasn't of no importance at all, because he was never offhand, it wasn't proper and twice in one conversation was too much to be a flukey mistake.

"What, you plan on buying your way out of that too?" I rolled my eyes, money might get a person far, but through medical school? I don't know, I believed even money had its limits.

"No." he wasn't smirking until he turned and looked down at me again, "I never said I was _going_ to be a doctor."

"What?" I asked confused.

"Some things are pre-decided, and some things are out of the question." He smirked convincingly, too convincingly really.

I looked at him and I thought about how much I hated pity. He hated pity. It's something we understood. It's something we related on, it was a line we didn't cross and it wasn't thin in the least.

I looked away with nothing in my eyes, no pity or recognition.

"Maybe I'll just be a house wife" I said.

He laughed. I'd said the right thing. So I hit him and grinned.

After that conversation it was understood... that we understood I suppose. We knew what was out there and that it didn't matter. We understood that we didn't want pity, and we didn't want someone to say that they understood. We were just talking. That was beautiful, that was the art I was talking about. Life as it was supposed to be meaningless and random. We were, if anything, not contrived.


	6. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

-

Some days we'd end up talking for hours; some days we'd just walk, without the need for words we carefully selected our paths, mostly walking up in the closest town. We tended to avoided popular haunts and just strolled around town, it was weird, to be reminded that there was a world where we couldn't just walk next to each other; a world so silly that two people couldn't be friends.

We talked about anything, related or unrelated to us. One day, in late winter we were wandering and talking.

"So let's hear it Weasley," Malfoy said.

"Hear what?" He genuinely confused me a lot.

"Valentines day. Are you the kind of girl that gushes and dresses up all in pink or are you the kind that hates valentines day and all the horrid cheer and romance it creates?" even if a darkish gloom hadn't marred his face, I didn't have to guess which one he was.

I laughed, but he looked fairly serious in his pursuit of an answer. "I don't know, I guess both. It is nice isn't it, a day for love? But then again… it is pretty horrid." This time he laughed with me, or maybe at me.

"So you'd want your boyfriend to drop a big presumptuous bouquet of roses on you during breakfast?" and an eyebrow rose, somewhat critically but mostly questioningly.

I laughed this time, alone, "Malfoy if I had a boyfriend he wouldn't be the kind to drop a bouquet on me, and especially _not _roses."

"Are you a roses and babies breath kind of man, Malfoy?"

He smirked at me, "I don't really care for getting flowers actually." I smirked this time, it didn't shock me. He looked at me knowingly and defiantly.

"Don't get me wrong Weasley, it's flattering and such but giving flowers means a person know nothing about me at all." I don't know what he was trying to prove by saying it, words were a game to him half the time. A game you had to play and loose to figure out.

"Yea," I nodded, "I guess that's what flowers mean most of the time, 'I like you but I don't know what you like.'" I didn't mind playing, he wasn't too self-righteous when he came out victorious.

We walked a little more and then I picked the conversation up again. "But not always." We were in front of the local pub by then and our conversation was interrupted with going in, sitting down and ordering.

"Anyways," I said having ordered some soup and cocoa, "I personally don't have that much against getting flowers Malfoy; I'm just not partial to roses." A less than attractive face graced my features, roses _really_ weren't my thing. They were just so… not pretty to me.

"So, if it was a bouquet of daffodil's you'd be up the wall?" He would of course pick a loud obnoxious almost weed like flower. It was like I couldn't appreciate fine things like the sophisticated groomed and pruned rose. Cause I was just a loud obnoxious daffodil that sprung up in the garden along with the weeds.

I gave it a second of thought, "Daffodils are actually quite nice, I wouldn't be up the wall but certainly much more impressed." To me weed was just a silly label for some very pretty flowers.

"Knew you'd like daffodils… of _all _flowers." he muttered, "Then what _would_ impress you Weasley?" no matter how adverse he made his voice, I knew, or I could tell that he really had nothing against daffodils; but I wondered, would he appreciate my first choice?

"Daisies." I said simply. Out food came and our server places down my cocoa and soup in front of me, I smiled and thanked them. As Draco got his dish of steak and potatoes he nodded slightly and continued talking. Typical, but surprisingly not rude.

"Daisies…" he said, like he couldn't comprehend the word. He could play a game with me, but I could play mine too.

"Yes, actually, I'd be quite impressed with a bouquet of daisies… but maybe not _pleased_." I said continuing my train of thought and dipping my spoon into my soup. I could tell he was going to get frustrated with my train of thought and conversation and believe me, that was a fringe benefit to say the least.

"Jesus Weasley, you're a difficult woman! What would please you then?" he was staring at me with a slightly alarmed look. I suppose the mere thought that a lady couldn't be won over by expensive and rare roses was beyond his realm of comprehension.

"A potted daisy would please me, I suppose." I said, he looked somewhat affronted and suspicious, "But not _dazzle _ me." and on queue he rolled his eyes. I loved it.

He looked at me half exasperated, "Well?"

"A patch of daisies." I said smiling, dipping some complementary bread in my soup. Thoroughly enjoying myself, Especially since Malfoy looked so confused and apparently felt it too as he hadn't even touched his food.

He looked at me with an expression that said, 'Explain yourself woman!'

I looked at him for a second, half sizing him up the other half just wanting to be infuriating; then realized he might understand, or at least try to. "Just a small daisy patch would do. If you love someone, grow them flower's, don't pick them." I said. "That's the worse kind of apology, and I don't want an apology." I said matter of-factly "And of course a potted plant is good but it's still confined to the pot."

"Of course!" he assented halfway mockingly, but not really, "and why the daisy? The rose too pretentious and overused I suppose?" he asked.

"No," I grinned this time, "daisies are just my favorite flower." He rolled his eyes

"And the daffodil's?"

"Well. I think they're quite nice too!" he snorted and I grinned.

"Well Malfoy," I said smiling, "you asked what kind of girl _I_ am. I wasn't answering for the general female population, for them im sure some nice roses would suffice. I think if my boyfriend knew to give me daisies, then it wouldn't just a last ditch attempt to impress me with plain old rose and it wouldn't just a random stab in the dark either, in attempts of just guessing what obscure flower would impress me. Cause I mean seriously, who is impressed with a daisy?"

He wasn't grinning, smirking or scowling now, he just looked amused and lifted his arms gesturing to me.

"That's right! Me!" I said "Me, me, me! What kinda flower strikes your fancy Malfoy?" I asked fairly interested.

"I'm not a flower kind of guy" he said again, "I'd prefer to just be given something else he said." and he shook his head at me, like I was too complicated and started eating his steak and potatoes; neither of us brought up the subject again.


	7. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

-

-

It was always cold when we sat outside, because it was winter, and even on nice days it was nippy at best. So sometimes we just sat, it was really too cold to move sometimes.

"This is nice." I said one day, referring to sitting by the lake and doing nothing.

"Sure." he said. I was lying down next to him as usual and he was looking dignified, as usual.

"So nice I could almost die!" I said dramatically, I didn't even try to hide it, because I was unconcerned with what he thought.

He looked down at me to reveal his raised eyebrow.

I grinned up, "I intend on dying at the pinnacle of my happiness Malfoy. And maybe this isn't exactly happiness but thus far this is the pinnacle of contentedness for me."

"Really," he said "and how will you know when that is, the pinnacle of your happiness, what if you die early and you miss the REAL pinnacle."

"Well it wouldn't be the REAL pinnacle Malfoy." I rolled my eyes, "because I would have missed it and my existence would be over. So it wouldn't be possible to be the pinnacle of _my_ existence if my existence weren't present."

"Of course." He nodded, and I was pretty sure he was pacifying me.

"I'm serious Malfoy! Don't you want to die happy?" I asked tentatively. I assumed that's what everyone wanted ultimately.

"I think that's asking a bit much of the world; isn't it a bit less presumptuous to live happily?" he retorted not too loudly, he really never got riled up like me but he was usually sincere, beneath the sarcasm and the cold front. Maybe not to everyone, but to me, his actions spoke louder than anything, and they were always sincere.

"I guess I could see that do you live happily Malfoy?" I wondered out loud.

"I said it would be less presumptuous Weasley, not reasonable." He rolled his eyes.

"Yea," I said and continued looking up, "but still…"

"I could almost die." I was content to be there, and I knew he was too; his eyes were all too sincere for him to deny it.

He rolled his eyes and kept looking out but with a half smile on his face. And I kept looking up at the clouds.

It was a few weeks after that that I walked down one early morning to our spot and was surprised to see him waiting for me. It isn't like I was always first but he rarely waited, in fact neither of us ever waited. He'd usually be smoking a cigarette or looking out over the lake and wouldn't really even move when I came.

We didn't wait for each other; it was more like we were wandering and happened to wander along side each other, enjoying the company.

But this time, I could tell he was waiting for me. He was standing and looking out at the lake, but it wasn't in his usual, aloof unconcerned way, he seemed to be more lost in thought. He was half facing the direction of the castle and turned and looked at me as I came down towards the lake.

I raised my eyebrows, I wasn't even sure he would be up this time, it was so early in the morning and it wasn't unheard of to come to the spot and the other not being there. But he was, and he was waiting.

I got in earshot of him and he didn't say anything. So I waved, not sure what to say.

He nodded at me in response, apparently with no intention of speaking. When I re-live this memory—for this is one I remember well—I feel nervous walking down towards him, but in reality I was barely nervous I was curious.

I almost always opened my mouth first; I didn't usually open it second and certainly not last, but I was the initiator. Yet that day, his silence was like his own kind of initiation. He silently said something interesting that we would talk about for hours, and I was responding silently; but as much as I concentrated I couldn't figure out what we were talking about.

As soon as I was standing next to him our nonverbal conversation ended. My mouth was trying to form audible words to ask: 'what do you want?' that didn't sound as rude as those actual words. Instead of giving me a second to think though, he started to walk toward the forest by our school. I took the hint and followed him

We walked through the woods for some time. It was an odd silence. He didn't seem angry or contemplative but just silent. His hands were in his pockets and his stride was long, and I semi awkwardly trailed next to him.

Some minuets later he stopped and turned to look at me, some how I'd fallen a few steps behind, probably because his stride was so long and mine so… not.

"What?" I asked feeling harassed, it might have been a brisk pace for him, but with shorter legs I was almost running beside him the whole time. And the silence was not conversational, it was just silent. Considering that I felt so frazzled that I could feel my hair frizzing, he looked all together too put together.

He grinned at me thought, and that was all as he stood in front of an opening in the woods.

I was ready to open my mouth and say something snarky and abrasive; except he stopped me short again, this time by stepping aside just then. He had a grin on his face. Maybe it was because he was grinning after all that odd silence or because his eyes weren't grinning but smiling, but right then I began to get nervous.

My heart was swelling in my chest, for some reason, pressing against the walls that tried to contain it down, but that only made it swell more. I was so nervous it almost hurt. If you have never felt as I felt then, than I am excited for you, cause when it happens it is the most terrifyingly wonderful feeling. Some people call it 'getting weak at the knees' but it is really so much more than that. It's your limbs and your heart and your head all going haywire at the same time. That's what I was in that second, staring into his smiling eyes.

I stared at him for a few seconds, nervous and confused; then looked past him into the opening he had just unblocked. I don't know if I gasped, but I must have.

There was a clearing in the forest that looked like the ground had been melted to uncover the earth bellow and there was a small field of daisies, not a potted daisy or a small patch, but a small field.

I looked at him.

He raised his eyebrows at me, staring. "You said you'd be beyond thrilled with a patch of daisies, you must have known I wouldn't settle to just be dazzling?"

I looked up at him blankly; I couldn't remember ever being left wordless, even by him. My mind was racing, February 14th? He'd never said anything about it, was I suppose to get something for him? How had he done it? But wait…

"It's not February though!" I managed to get out.

"Yea well, I don't really care for Valentines Day, so over done and predictable." He rolled his eyes. I couldn't even process what he told me. I was just buying time for myself, trying to process what he had _done_ for me. Later though, now, I think it was all too appropriate, he wasn't a Valentines Day kind of guy, like I wasn't a rose kind of girl.

I blinked my eyes staring at the field—at my field—of daisies. He walked back toward me until he was blocking my view, forcing my gaze up towards him. He stared down at me and smirked, I could see the self satisfaction in his face and my face starting to form a glare in response.

He cut my dirty look off though, by leaning his face forward so his mouth was right next to my ear.

It felt like my breath caught in my throat then, but I don't think I'd actually been breathing for a while. I still hadn't processed anything. All I could see was his face and a field of daisies, it was as if my vision had been blocked out and no matter where I turned it was all I could see. Frozen, I could feel part of him moving in front of me; it was his arm because a moment later I felt it touch my side lightly.

"You said you'd be impressed with him if he knew, I guess this makes me your boyfriend huh?" he whispered his mouth still right next to my ear. I was pulled out of my daze and everything in front of me came back into focus, the cold air, the rest of the forest and my breath.

I pulled my head back to look at him in the eye and was half exasperated half amused. "It doesn't work that way I said!" hoping I sounded like I was joking but not really sure; my senses were still a little addled.

He grinned at me whatever my tone was and put his other arm on my waist. He pulled me toward him again, flush against him, put his forehead on my left temple and whispered to me again.

"Yes it does."

My words weren't stuck in my throat this time, I just didn't have any. Finally I said the only thing I could think.

"No it doesn't…" except not really, I was really saying: 'yes it does.' he drew his head back and looked at me in the face.

"Well?" he looked expectant.

"Well what?!" I asked, red in the face, embarrassed and somewhere in that embarrassment bouncing off the walls. I belonged with him, I knew it, I knew he knew it; the thought had just never crossed my mind before.

"Where's my present?" he demanded with a grin. I'm pretty sure he was expecting something though.

I glared at him and opened my mouth. "I wasn't aware we were- I…" I glared up at him for making me unable to tell him off. How do you tell off the boy that took your dreams and kicked them up a notch?

I glared at him and he grinned down back at me still holding me around the waist, waiting…

Then, still glaring I put my hands carefully on his chest, and looked at him challengingly. He raised his eyebrows down at me, wondering if I was actually going to push him away. Without breaking eye-contact I lifted myself on to my tip toes and kissed him lightly on the lips, and drew back. Not likely.

He looked down at me darkly almost glaringly.

"Well!" I said, "I knew you weren't a flower kind of guy!"

He just looked at me and dipped his face down and gave me a kiss that was neither light nor short.

When we both eventually drew back for air he grinned down at me. "Yes it does."

I didn't even refute him this time. "What would you have done if I wanted a big presumptuous bouquet of roses over breakfast in the great hall?" I asked evilly.

"I guess you'll never know" he said smugly.

I guess that's when he became my boyfriend. It was more then just boyfriend though. It was something that couldn't be labeled as simply as that. I guess you'd call it love.

I'd been right too but I didn't realize it until too late. It was that moment that was the pinnacle of my happiness; but when standing there, kissing him, I assumed it could only be the beginning. It hadn't been the end but I made the mistake. The mistake I told Malfoy I ought not and would not make, I assumed that which the future would hold.

I should have known then, the moment I assumed something of the future, that I'd done wrong. We were people of the present. Whatever I assumed would or would or would not happen in the future though, it was a glorious present. It was having a best friend, and nothing in the world, and I mean nothing, compares to that.


	8. Chapter 7

Chapter 7

-

-

Best friends, real ones, are as good as it gets; when you have someone you love purely for who they are and whom you relate to and who you can be crappy and faulty around. It's someone who cares about you because of who you are. Who is honestly okay with you're imperfections.

Falling in love doesn't compare, because falling in-love, so often involves the physical; gaining a best friend is everything beyond physical. Him and I had gone beyond that. We fell in love with our best friends. It was perfect. We were best friends that loved each other that were also _in_ love. You'd think the two would conflict or overlap, but they didn't.

It was all a joke, well a half joke. We came up with intricate plans on what we'd do when we left school; the weird and secluded lives we'd lead. We'd get married and go off and not refuse to come back but be unconcerned with the idea. Really, I loved other people, I did. I loved my family and my friends and the school, my whole world; but life was okay without them and with him. I could live and function without him but he made things more than bearable. He made things better than nice he made things alive, and I made our days colorful. You think that'd be it, youd think the world would be happy that we'd done it and help us do it.

He said it a lot; not as if to reassure me that he still meant it, but to almost remide me that it was inevitable and I couldn't avoid it even.

"I'm going to marry you Weasley and put an end to this nonsense." he would say when I brought my brother up or my family. I had a knack of bringing down our fantastic dreams by having one of my brother hunt us down in a fit of rage and kill Draco.

Or he'd say: "When I marry you Weasley you're going to have to spend time with me after 8pm" those days, when night fell, we'd go back inside and as our sanctuary melted away into the distance, as did the world that allowed us to be together.

He'd say things like that and I'd sarcastically or playfully shoot down his adamant words, mostly cause I knew him and I knew if he was saying something like that, he was actually of the intention of doing them. There were a few things he wanted that he didn't get. I also, inside, wanted him to make it possible to be with each other. So bad that I didn't want to jinx it by encouraging it. I don't think it mattered to Draco. He would do it regardless of if my insides were begging him to or not.

That's how he was sincere.

One day he found me and I wasn't with my notebook, doodling idly. I was doing science homework.

"Man Weasley, those are some intense thoughts" he said standing next to me and looking down at the parchment on my lap.

"Shut it, I have homework to do." I didn't even turn my head that was the best friend beauty part, I didn't have to entertain him with frivolous kindness.

"Snape assigned this a week ago and I totally forgot about it because I was tramping around Hogsmead all afternoon on Wednesday with some _schmuck_." I looked up quickly and glared and then went back to my scribbling.

He raised one eyebrow and after a few moments of silence said, "Did you just call me a _schmuck_?"

I didn't even respond I could practically hear his eyes roll though "I thought it was worth it" he said anyways.

"Yea sure, not when Snape is glaring down my neck." I had quite the temperament. It was a good thing I didn't have to be sensitive around him.

"Want me to help?" he asked a few minuets later, apparently over being called a shmuck. I could tell he was bored but I wasn't entertaining him that day, not with all my homework.

He just sat next to me for a while, when I didn't respond, I suppose eventually the novelty of silence wore off and he moved the book I was reading so it rested on both of our laps, when it became clear I wasn't going to be responding to his offer.

Being irritated, irritable and stressed I snatched it back as faster than he could respond and gave him the dirties look I could manage in the four seconds I allotted to lift my gaze from my work.

"No! I can do this by myself" have I ever mentioned I had a thin, miniscule, oh so attractive sliver of pride?

"Pft." A sliver of pride he was quite used to.

So we sat, one scribbling furiously, the other looking out, unamused and unaffected. I was steadily writing, bent over my parchment so low that my hair made a curtain between my face and him.

"DAMNIT." After a few seconds he reached his hand over and lifted my hair up to reveal an empty ink bottle on its side and the worlds I'd been scribbling on my parchment for the last hour drowned in a sea of ink.

After letting out an intelligible shriek out, eventually, fragments of frustration came out "Stupid. God damn. Quill." Frustration did not do wonders for my vocabulary.

He removed the, now empty, ink bottle from my lap and grabbed my shoulders and rested his arms on my shoulders shaking my slightly.

"Calm down Weasley." he we less than perturbed; I think he was all too familiar with my over dramatic and explosive temperament.

"This is the THIRD time this week—all over my homework!"

"Luckily Flitwick's a push over… and Trelawny couldn't give two shits about what you actually write; in _fact_ she probably had more fun guessing!"

"Calm down," he calmly cleaned it up and then just sitting quietly next to me. He always knew right when to cut me off; not soon enough that I didn't have time to vent but before I got into the full swing of a rant. I knew his words and actions were to pacify and it irritated me but worked.

"Whatever…" I mumbled, pacified and not happy about it.

I sat grumbling for a few moments more just to prove he didn't control me but stopped eventually, just like he smugly knew I would.

I was pretty calm though and I just sat, in my after-outburst haze. He laid his head on the ground next to my knee and it would brush against me every once in a while. I think he liked to remind me of his presence, as if I could ever forget.

"Someday Weasley," it was an off hand moment, his voice and body language were off hand.

"Someday?" it was always wiser to just let him talk and not try to interrupt, he'd get into the flow of things faster. There were a couple minuets of silence. I always figured he formulated exactly what he was going to say when he was silent, because things always came out perfectly from him, he never stuttered and his words always flowed to a certain rhythm. I figured it would take him a while to start actually talking, so I started rewriting my homework on a fresh piece of parchment.

"Someday we're going to make it." He said it matter of-factly.

"Mhm, yea, sure." I nodded my head, listening but not really paying attention.

"We are." he nodded back at me.

"No more of this exploding quill nonsense?" I said distractedly, I really didn't multitask well.

"No more of this." was all he responded with, he wasn't bothered that I wasn't listening, but it certainly wasn't going to stop him from saying what was on his mind.

"Yea? What's it going to be instead then?"

Then there was another pause, I knew he would take a few moments to perfect his words and continue. Greatfull for the pause I had re-written most of what I'd lost. But instead of a few moments pause and more words. He grabbed my homework smearing his fingers through the fresh ink and throwing it, ink bottle and all, into the lake. Hurling it as far as he could, which was quite far. I could see it bobbing, floating by the empty ink bottle too far for me to ever retrive.

"Malfoy, what the hell—" I glared up at him, further irritated to see him calm and collected as if he hadn't just destroyed a couple hours of work.

Instead of responding, he got to his feet and looking around him a little, as if it were the first time he'd seen the lake and the trees. Like everyday that he sat staring at it all, he hadn't actually absorbed any of it ever. Before I could open my mouth to tell him off, he grabbed my arm and yanked me up to my feet, unwillingly I'll add.

"Malfoy—Malfoy, let _go_."

But instead of letting me go he just pulled me toward the forest.

"Malfoy, my _essay_." He didn't respond. I knew he wouldn't but it irritated me the same. With every step toward the forest he moved faster, and faster until we were running; running as fast as I possibly could and then he pulled me to go faster.

We ran, and ran, and reached the forest and then we ran faster and deeper in. My breath got shorter and shorter and my legs burned; but all of a sudden it was only important that we could run as far and as fast as we could. So I just grasped Malfoy's hand more tightly and ran right ahead. We ran for what must have been miles.

Eventually we stopped and we were somewhere towards the middle of the Forbidden Forest; far from school, far from regulation and boundaries.

My chest was burning and my face was like ice. I felt like I was floating on water and if I moved, I'd sink. We didn't talk, I don't think I could have if I had tried; I spent the next ten minuets getting my breath half way regular.

We sat by a tree; in summer and spring the forest was dark and the leaves blocked the light, but in winter there were no leaves and the white skies were seen above. We sat there, in the white, snow blanketed forest, looking at the white sky above, miles from school.

I turned to him once and he was sitting, doing what I was doing; grasping my hand, looking at the sky and catching his breath.

The more our breath came back the tighter he held my hand and the more I sagged against the tree. It didn't bring my energy back but it sapped me of it with each steadying breath instead. So I just looked up through the tree branches and rested.

I wasn't thinking, I wasn't even trying to process what we'd just done. There was no need to; there was nothing to explain, we had just had to.

After half an hour he stood up and still grasping each others hands I came up with him.

Then he grinned, really grinned, at me. His face was pinker than she'd ever seen it and his hair tossled and stuck to his face by sweat in a few places. He seemed so real just then at that moment. It was like if I reached and touched him I knew he'd be hot from running and to me, it made it so real; everything before hadn't been a dream but so dream_like_. That was real.

"How about that Weasley?" he said, like he'd won an argument. An argument that, until after miles of running and half an hour of short breathing, I finally understood we were having.

I stared at him and looked up at his smiling eyes and saw Winter. It was a beautiful, serene winter; one that wasn't cold and uninviting but sparkling and pure, like the snow and sky that surrounded us just then.

Before I had enough of staring at him and realizing how pretty his eyes were I was wondering how long we could run. It was exhilarating until it was tiring. If we ran, how long would it be before we just completely burnt out? Before I could continue or finish my thoughts he kissed me.

He didn't pull me toward him, he didn't even touch me with anything but his lips; but he bent his head and just kissed me for a long meaningful moment. When he drew back to look at me, they were with the same eyes.

The first thing I could say, the only thing I could think to say was "What about my homework."

He laughed at me and the scariness of what we'd just done stopped hitting me and I reach out and punched him on the arm.

It wasn't a real hit, it was just banter "What about my homework you ass, the lakes not just going to regurgitate that!" I had to get worked up about something, or I might realize something too big for me; or even worse, something that wasn't too big, something I just didn't want to be there.

"I know Weasley." He just smiled and now put his arms around my waist looking down at me.

"What the hell am _I_ supposed to do, Snape _hates _me. He wont be giving me a break." I was getting lost in the faux-anger.

"I know." Was all he said, he was just staring at me and letting me yell at him. It one of those things that I look back at and treasure, but irritated me more than anything in the moment.

"You better have a plan ass hole." As angry as it was for loosing my homework, I didn't have a doubt that it was worth it; the F or detention I would in all likelihood get couldn't make me, not even for a second, think it wasn't.

"I know." he said again and kissed me again.

This time I was semi ready for it and kissed him back. They weren't deep lusty kisses, they were, 'I'm standing here next to you' kisses. They were, 'this is our moment' kisses.

Our kiss didn't deepen but I put my hand on his shoulder and clutched it, afraid to reach up to his neck and pull him close and afraid of drawing back, needing to hold on, hard. I was afraid of what moving would do and what would change the moment I did.

It wasn't me that moved first, he moved his hand from my waist and reached out to the open air beside him. I felt a smile form on his lips and his other hand stayed on my waist. Suddenly that hand grabbed at my side and I shrieked out in laughter. In that moment, before I came down on him for tickling me there was a flash. Before even yelling at him I looked up and in his other hand he held a camera.

"You!" and the anger was building again.

He grinned and slowly raised his arm with the camera in it, far above my reach

"You _give it here!"_ I could see him looking wickedly down at me.

"Just for memories." he replied to my unanswered question and with the flick of my wrist I yanked his arm and the camera went off again, this time in his face alone.

He looked at me appalled, candid wasn't his way. It was okay for me to be shocked and unprepared but what if the camera caught him with a bad hair arrangement, he was, if any sin very vain.

I just scoffed at him and his expression, "I'd like one that's proper and shows your _true_ nature." I glared referring to his smirky look of satisfaction.

He just laughed at me and we walked around the forest, not exactly heading back to school, just moving. I knew any direction we headed, eventually would take us back to school, for that day at least. It did too, two or three hours later as dusk settled in, the forest disappeared behind us and we were standing between our spot, invisible but which we knew was there, and the school. We walked to school holding hands, everyone was at dinner and they didn't see us. I almost wish they had. We walked in, smiled, said goodnight and went to our respective dormitories. As I fell asleep that night I was happy, still. Looking back I shouldn't have been happy, we should have kept running that day, we should have never stopped, but we did.


	9. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

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For the time that we were together Christmas came neither too quickly nor too late. He was going back to his home for Christmas and so was I; originally we were both going to remain at the school and skirt our other lives a little more but his father insisted he come home, so we celebrated our Christmas a week early. Of course it was by the lake.

"Happy Christmas Draco!" I came bounding over the hill too our spot. I loved Christmas, even if it wasn't the real day this was the one I was spending with Draco, it was more real. That's what he did for me.

He smirked at me looking at a brightly wrapped box in my hand.

"Got something there Weasley?" I inspected him carefully in the few seconds it took to walk over too him and didn't see a hint of a present on him; of course I acted like I hadn't noticed he didn't get me anything. Draco, as he himself would say, wasn't an ordinary boy, he didn't like doing things by the book.

"Yes, I've got something for you." I blushed, maybe I shouldn't have given him anything. Embarrassed, but feigning laxness, I sat on my usual rock and got out my sketchbook. He sat next to me, I could smell cigarette smoke on him, apparently he'd already smoked. I started drawing the lake, today not idly but intent on making everything perfect; so concentrated that I wouldn't have to say anything. I didn't know what to say. For some reason sitting next to him just then was awkward.

Perhaps, it was too contrived I thought as I drew. We generally planned nothing, we just acted as life happened but today we had planned in particular. Making sure it would fit into both of our schedules. Maybe that was wrong, maybe it was wrong to make our relationship work on a schedule.

I saw a flash of red in the corner of my eye and Draco was fingering the bow of the box I'd brought

"Hey! You cant open that!" a glared at him and snatched the box back, a little jokingly, but with a real glare in my eyes. I hadn't thought of a graceful way to give it to him and make it nonchalant, I had just assumed we would exchange. I got the feeling as I acted, that what I was doing just then wasn't helping me in my quest for grace.

"Isn't it for me?" he rose his eyebrow and said matter of-factly.

I didn't respond but stuck my chin out and rolled my eyes at him and went back to my drawing. The trees of the forest weren't the right distance from the lake, I moved them to the right a little and too the left a little but couldn't make it fit just right. Proportion had always been a sore point for me. I turned my pencil to erase to stupid trees again when Malfoy reached his hand out and slammed it on my paper. I jumped and turned to him.

"What the hell Malfoy! What are you trying to give me a heart attack?" he didn't even respond he just shrugged and looked at me intently.

I rolled my eyes again and stared at him for a few more seconds for good measure and then inspected the trees again and decide that I had the position right but they were just drawn a smidge too big. I looked back down to draw them to find not the ghost of too many erasings but a small black velvet box.

My breath caught in my throat. Malfoy wasn't you're ordinary kind of guy, he would never give me a present wrapped prettily in green and red with a smile.

I felt his nose touching my temple and his body pressed up against my back.

"I guess you can open yours first if you want." His head was looking over my shoulder.

I sat a few seconds, looking at the little box he'd set none too gently on my paper and the trees melted into the distance.

"Jesus, you didn't _really _think I didn't get you anything did you?" I was too busy staring at the box to feel more embarrassed. I reached out carefully and picked it up off my sketchbook; I slowly and carefully opened it, making sure to make my movements slow and deliberate.

I looked down and my eyes widened.

On Christmas he gave me an empty ring box.

"What the hell is this Malfoy?" I turned my head sharply and faced him nose to nose, not angry but baffled and put off. I didn't get it. Was it a joke? Did he think that was funny? Did he think it was a laugh to have me sit there and in the ten seconds I took picture what was inside, if we'd ever get married, what he meant by giving me a ring? Was this his idea of a sick joke?

"That is a promise for forever." He didn't sound like he was joking, he sounded, like he always did; matter of fact.

I looked at him, I still didn't get it, I wasn't sure what he meant still.

"You can't have the ring," he continued slowly, "until you say 'yes' though."

I still looked at him, this time my eyebrows raised but a small smile starting to form in my heart and my heart jumping. Opening my mouth—"But" he began again cutting me off before words could come out, "you can't say yes until I ask." He said pointedly

He looked at me for a few seconds, while I processed his words.

"So I'm going to promise you." I nodded. I got it. I grasped the ring box firmly in my hands, it was more precious than a ring. It was a promise and he never broke promises.

"Don't worry" he smirked "I got you a present you can hold and touch now too."

The ring box was still clutched in my hand tightly, I didn't want to give it back, I didn't want a different present.

The box was real; he was real. He wasn't perfect but it didn't get more perfect; no more perfect than a slightly bitter boy and an empty ring box; sitting there next to him I knew that was what I had wanted for Christmas.

He took the ring box from me, prying my fingers off it one by one and chuckling at me quietly while I glared at him. He opened it and removed the cushion where the ring would have been and underneath was a tiny charm bracelet.

"You didn't honestly think I would give you an empty ring box Weasley?" and he rolled his eyes.

I recovered and was looking at him straight in the face; somehow we had repositioned without my noticing; knee to knee, cross legged with my sketchbook resting over our ankles.

"There are only two charms" and once again my ungraceful response to great gestures on his part came out; I almost wanted to hit myself in the face. I turned bright red instead I think.

"Why would I give you a full charm bracelet Weasley?" his face actually looking at me questioningly. He stared at me and smirked.

"There's always time to add." He took the bracelet and undid and redid the clasp around my wrist, "Patience." He ran his fingers along the two charms and they tinkled. I stared at it. I loved it, but the ring box was once again clutched in my hand. I loved that more.

I reached behind me and put his brightly wrapped box on his lap. He opened it just like I knew he would, carefully taking everything apart, as if he were saving them incase he had to put it all back together.

Inside the box I had given him a scarf I'd knit him, it was a scarf with red leaves on a green background on one end that turned into white snow flakes on a light blue background on the other end, it had taken a month to get the gradation right; a month of discovering shading with yard was much harder than with pencil.

Inside the scarf I had wrapped all the sketches, doodlings and random writings dated and tied together. It was our whole relationship in several un-interpretable sometimes illegible pages.

He un-warped the scarf carefully and looked at the top page for a very long time and then rewrapped it carefully and held the scarf in both his hands. We sat next to each other me clutching the future him holding the past. I leaned against him, so I could feel the present too; and that was Christmas for us; we skipped lunch and dinner and sat, occasionally talking. I finished my sketch; it looked pretty good except the tree's looked too small.

I told him it was a whole winter until the world turned green again; I didn't realize then that I was all too correct, winter was just a short pause in the life cycle, but the greens and reds would come again and dominate the trees and everything around us. Soon it would be warm, and in all likelihood our very secret spot would be walked by daily, the water by which we sat would be swam in by our peers. Spring was coming.

It's strange he was spring. But he was, and I was still Autum no matter how much we loved the winter.


	10. Chapter 9

A general note, it is becoming clearer and clearer through reviews and friends that I am in great need of a beta, if there is anyone here that is willing I would be much obliged. To the rest: happy reading, and thanks for reading!

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Chapter 9

It was ending, winter was; the snow melted and little green sprigs started to pop up where before had been a blanket of snow.

The forest became a muddy mass of roots and twigs and the privacy enjoyed from the winter cold would soon come to an end for us.

The family ties that Draco and I had long ignored came unfurling out of no where, just like we had known they would; but the seeds had lain idle all season, were forgotten and catching me unprepared, budded suddenly and grew quickly.

Mine and Draco's relationship went on though. We would meet at the lake, perhaps less than before but often enough. Sometimes little signals were sent to each other a glance or an owl without a letter attached the morning or the night before.

Because spring had come we had to abandon our spot by the lake though; instead we explored deeper and deeper into the woods. It never occurred to me then, that no matter how deep we went into the wood, eventually we would come out of it. I was living off the high of being with someone that made me whole. The idea had never even seemed plausible before. I lived off the promise I knew Draco wouldn't break.

Unlike Christmas break, at Easter vacation we both went home; our families were both calling for us and the call was getting so loud that neither of us could deny them any longer. Letters from my mother and pestering from my brother and his friends were constant. His parents also were pressuring him in their own way. So I went home to the coddling and cramped love that my family was and he to his own version of break.

It was a good time, though I missed him; I didn't feel exactly at home anymore but I was still happy to see my family and wake up knowing I was in a house with so many bodies and people I loved that the day would not go by without much laughter and much love induced irritation.. We didn't speak with each other for that week and I didn't think it was odd. I didn't feel the need to write him a letter and I'm sure neither did he. Our relationship was present and real, it was face to face and in the moment; even a letter was a transition too much of a delay.

I came back to school worn and refreshed from visiting with my family. In good spirits my desire to see him grew with each moment that the possibility was more realistic. I was nervous that perhaps seeing his family had not done him the good it had done me. It had indeed done me good; all that time I spent with him gave me the chance to miss my family a bit. Something that had never happened before as they were always constantly with me. His family on the other hand, though he never really talked about them, I knew was not like mine.

The day I came back I searched him out in the great hall and made quick eye contact which he did not exactly return. Sometimes though Malfoy was so quick he didn't even aknolwage, I knew he'd caught my glance so I didn't need to make a nuisance and spectacal of myself to catch his. It looked as if his vacation home hasn't been as pleasant as mine had, he looked like a wreck. I'm sure no one could tell though. He was too concentrated, too preoccupied with everything in front of him. I don't think he even saw me.

Maybe I should have written him a letter though. That afternoon he never came. I walked around the lake four or five times and finally went in to dinner. I didn't know how to feel, first I was angry, then worried and then irate. By the time I was in the great hall I was a ball of fury I considered lashing out at him even in public if need be.

I walked into dinner and there he was.

I looked at him and his gaze was looking up from his plate and his eyes crossed over mine, except it was just as it had been earlier that year, as if he didn't know if I did or did not exist. As if I were a blank face in the crowd.

I understood then the double edged sword that being invisible was. There is no freedom like it, and there is no pain like it. I wouldn't get the picture yet though. I wouldn't believe that he was throwing in the towel. I stared at him the whole dinner. Making a fool of myself, the kind of fool only love can make of you; the only kind of fool worth being, on the off chance that you end up with the dream.

Well, I didn't end up with the dream. I was just another fool in love. We never spoke again, I understood after that night that things had changed, I didn't know why or when or how but I knew they had. I wasn't such a fool that the truth escaped me completely.

Even for myself, I realized going home that somehow after the wonderful winter I'd had, those obligations came sneaking up. Academic pressures, friends and family were piling on fast from all the neglect I'd exhibited. Without him I finally chanced to glimpse the damage I needed repair. I thought it was good then, that I had so much to do so I wouldn't have to think about him. I thought probably he'd recognize the same in his life and that I would get my life back in proper order, and he would as well and when everything was good again, I'd look up one morning and he'd be look at me for a second and I'd meet him at the lake.

It never happened, later, not too much later I found out what happened. In the one week I was not there for him his family had been. That week where perhaps he most needed reaffirmation that there was more outside his obligatory lifestyle I had not been there for him. I was not there, but his family was and he could not turn his back fast enough. He loved them, perhaps not the same way I loved my family, but they were his family, that I could understand. It still hurt, hurt a lot.

As the weeks wore on after Easter break, I chanced the occasional look at him every couple of days. Not only did I notice the subtle changes in his demeanor but I soon also recognized the presence of a very pretty very aristocratic looking girl that was in his constant company. The more I observed, the more I saw of her. The more I observed her, the more I hurt. She was pretty and she smiled with him and enjoyed his company and I would wonder if she was enjoying his words as well. She would hold his hand and enjoy the closeness and I couldn't help but wonder if she enjoyed his kisses too. Then one day, nearing the end of school her hand bore a ring on its finger. And that's when I resigned myself to near heart-break. I could only hope it wasn't the one he had picked for me.

I say near heart-break because as much as I hurt, I was still very much in love. I never saw him look at her like he cared, or talk to her at all for that matter. I still truly believed he loved me.

I had never exploded or tried to contact him. I knew him and I knew if he felt inclined to explain something to me he would and I would never get an explanation out of him other wise. I knew too that yelling at him would make me feel worse. I knew also that it wasn't just love it was more. Love I might be able to find again, but it was that something more that I had with Draco that made love undesirable by any other.

The last day of the school year was the last chance but before it even came I knew there was no chance. So when I got an owl that morning I was surprised. It wasn't alone though, it carried a parcel.

The paper was brown and wrapped awkwardly but precisely as if there were and oddly shaped but very delicate object within it. I took the package in my lap and opened it under the breakfast table, where only I could see it.

There lay was a single wilting daisy with a ring incircling its stem.

An apology.

There were no words with it; the words were posted everywhere else. In the paper, in peoples mouths. Marriage. A young couple, to be wed. Fresh out of school. Two prominent families finally coming together.

Malfoy and not me. That was all that mattered, Malfoy and someone else, Draco and some other girl.

She was of a prominent family, rich and powerful as was he. It was a perfect, expected, match; a young marriage with a good potential.

I didn't interfere; Draco and I were in the present, the then past. I knew Draco, I knew there was nothing to do and further more, there was no way for me to reach him. I didn't know how to reach out to him because he'd always been there.

Those months after school were a lull, I don't remember what I did or what people thought if me, but I know that I was not fully myself any more. Home still wasn't home, but I had no where else to be. I had surpassed the time of my greatest happiness and I was living in the aftermath, and I knew it.

Some months passed and one morning I saw the picture from his wedding. It hurt, it hurt that he was getting married. I couldn't believe that somehow he hadn't come to me, to explain what I didn't need explained. I knew what happened, his family and his life caught up with him and he bought right back into it, miserably but still into it. He had always implied that he never expected the great or wonderful for him. Only when he spoke like that to me I never expected that some day he would actually give in. but nevertheless, I knew it was what had happened.

The press had caught everything, the ceremony, the reception; I saw it all from my morning paper. I think that's finally when my heart broke. I never know how to explain it, a broken heart. It wasn't as if I'd died, or believed I wouldn't ever wake up again or be happy again. The feeling was so complete and overwhelming that I couldn't even comprehend the idea of feeling. He had even worn a daisy in his button hole for the ceremony. A short blurb under the picture told that his wife took it out at the reception reportedly said it was ugly and weeds didn't belong. The people thought it was a laugh. I guess it got swept out with the rest of the trash.

I was so sure he would never break the promise; I was so sure because he had never broken one before, then again, he'd never made one before.


	11. Chapter 10

The park was still windy and the leaves were still scattered in the air, falling and carpeting the ground. A little girl and an old lady sat on a park bench watching the commotion. They sat for some moments, motionless and silent before the little girl began to squirm, her legs started to twitch, her hands clasping and unclasping uncontrollably and finally her head turned to the old lady, who was holding her composure much better.

A little hand reached for a larger, older, much more wrinkled hand to finger a bracelet around it's wrist. The lady looked down at the girl as the bracelet was being examined; it was being examined not only with the big eyes of a little girl; but with her little hands as well. The lady watched the girl and smiled, a far off smile—one that said she wasn't really there, and she wasn't really happy.

The little girl touched the ladies arm lightly and brought her attention away from the tinkling bracelet to her childish face.

"Are you a witch?" she said with polite bluntness only a child's voice could make beautiful.

And for the first time real emotion played on the old woman's face, not an emotion from the past recycled and reused for the hundredth time but something current: shock.

"Excuse me?" she tried to hide her dumbfounded face quickly.

"It was Hogwarts right?" the little girl pressed, not just with her words but her little body pressing against the old lady, her fingers still clasped tightly around her chained wrist. Excitement bounced around the child, like light in a glass cube.

"Yes..." The lady was truthful but warily reserved.

"It's okay," the bouncing little girl reassured, now physically bouncing up and down on the bench, "I'm going to be a witch." The lady looked at her, not unkindly but blankly.

"I could tell you were a witch because of the way you had trouble describing the classes and quills and owls and messages, it was Hogwarts!" she was excitable, as children are when they have the upper hand and she rambled, her mouth moving fast and then faster yet.

"Yes," the lady smiled. "I guess I thought for a muggle they wouldn't have noticed my small slip ups and just ignore them."

The little girl looked up for a while with dark grey eyes. Her eyes then turned back down to the bracelet.

"There are three charms." She said slowly, serious now. The lady nodded looking down at the top of the little girls head. The little girl didn't move or look back up. "You said he only ever gave you two and you never saw him again."

"Yes, but as he said, I had much more time in my life, too much, after him. There was time to add."

The lady reached into her pocket and pulled out a wand and tapped one of the small silver charms lightly and it transfigured itself back into a wedding ring

"Oh" the little girl whispered more to herself than the lady, her little mouth making the sound more than her voice. She looked back up at the lady with her eyes sparkling but once their eyes met, the stopped mid-sparkle.

"He never talked to you again." she said, this time staring right at the lady. They weren't hurtful words, but Ginny hurt none the less and nodded. She hadn't actually felt hurt for years; it had all grown to be such a regular part of life. But the young life touching hers seemed to bring it all back to reality.

"I don't think he broke the promise." The little girl said, in response to what Ginny had not said.

"Why not?" Ginny asked curious more then offended by the little girl's words.

"Draco Malfoy died miserable." The little girl said as if it were a full explanation.

rather than trying to get a child to explain their too simple for adult comprehension thought process, Ginny just asked, "What makes you think that?"

"Mother said so." As her breath caught with shock she still thought to herself, she knew it'd be an easy answer but could it really be that easy?

Her heart pounding quickly she asked, slowly as she could, "What's your mother know about Draco Malfoy?"

The little girl rolled her eyes, apparently things had yet to be fantastical or unbelievable to her and this was just unbelievably obvious, "He was her father."

Of course he was. Ginny's breath left her completely. On top of the shock there was also embarsssment; Ginny had just revealed to Draco's granddaughter that ginnys life crumbled at her grandparent's marriage. Once again though, the little girl seemed not only to read her mind but respond bluntly and matter-of-factly to the point of Ginny's slight discomfort.

"Its okay, Grandmother knew."

It was the oddest thing to say, but little children seem to always get right to the point, they don't beat around the bush for comforts sake.

"Knew what?" Ginny asked, though she knew very well what.

"That she wasn't the one." The little girl wasn't going to make it anything more than it was; it was simple in her mind, but people like Ginny, adults, needed it explained to make it believable, and they both knew it.

"He wasn't her one either." She whispered grinning. "But I think she must have felt very bad," her face grew more solemn "because everyone knew grandfather was miserable. She at least wasn't miserable." She looked at Ginny in the eyes, but Ginny stayed silent and listened intently.

"Mother says he was a horrible and miserable person in his time," Ginny smiled.

"That doesn't surprise me. How do you know though? He died years ago; you couldn't have been more than three." It was comforting to know she still knew him, after all the years.

"Mother told me, she said he was mean but he was honest and that no one could wrong him because of that, not even grandmother for not loving her." She looked at Ginny harshly for the first time that afternoon.

"You can't wrong him for that either missus."

Ginny looked at the girl with a sad smile on her face. "I'm afraid I can."

"He never broke the promise." the little girl insisted.

"He never fell in love. And he never left you." She retorted with a fierce childlike eyes, "You never came after him."

"He never came after me." Ginny said softly.

"It wouldn't have been honest to." the little girl said raising her eyebrows.

Ginny looked down at the girl and the first truly emotional expression crossed her face during the whole afternoon and Ginny crying a little, and laughed a little at the same time nodded.

"No, I don't suppose it would have been." She assented. It wasn't so unbelievable that it would take a small child a few minuets to tell her the one life altering bit of wisdom she'd been seeking for decades.

That was the end of that, the woman thought. The little girl had bested her and looking to her left at her short companion she felt, for the first time, a feeling that was not remorse as she observed the autumn—with Draco Malfoy's granddaughter.

Some minuets later the little girl started tinkering with Ginny's bracelet again and re-examining the locket; she looked wickedly up at the Ginny.

"I think I see why he loved autumn so much." she said staring down and Ginny's once fiery read locks.

Ginny laughed again, and thought how she hadn't laughed so many times as she had in that one afternoon in years.

Ginny sat, and smiled a little. Still hurting after all those years, but understanding a little more.

Finally, hours after sitting on Ginny's bench in a huff the little girl rose, "This was much better than an afternoon tea, miss."

Ginny nodded. She didn't know whether to feel relieved or heart-broken that the little girl was leaving.

She wasn't the only one either; the little girl stared at the Ginny for a few minuets openly and unashamedly.

"He didn't sweep it out of his head either." she finally said.

"How would you know?" Ginny smiled, she didn't need the words of false comfort, the girl had already given her so much, but she appreciated the effort, "did he tell you?"

The little girl shook her head, this time she was the one smiling, she knew what Ginny was thinking "No but he told Mother."

Ginny stared at her again overwhelmed.

"Mother wasn't alive but grandmother told her the story and then she told me. Grandpa was mad, cause, well… we didn't really know but I guess it was because he loved you and grandmother knew it. They got in a big fight after their wedding and Grandmother said he said 'hurtful but too true' things. After that all mother would tell me was she never made Grandfather do anything again. When they had Mother, Grandfather named her Bellis and Grandmother didn't say a thing. Mother said it was the only thing Grandfather gave her, her whole life. _I _though that was mean and I told her so but mother said, no it wasn't, cause it was the only thing he ever gave anyone in his life that meant anything to him."

"Bellis?" Ginny asked.

"After Bellis pernnis," The little girl said looking at the old woman significantly, "It's the name of the common daisy."


End file.
